


The Many Shades of Death

by KittyWillCutYou



Category: Shinobi (PS2), Shinobi (Video Games)
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Character Death, Demonic Possession, Gen, Hotsuma had survivor's guilt, Minor Character Death, Ninjas - Freeform, Possessed Items, There is not and never was enough content for this series, Zombies, angsty ninjas, because of course, because why the hell not, cause it's fun to hurt ya favs, did I mention Hotsuma is a sad boy, his background is SPARSE AS SHIT, hold on to your pants ya'll, hotsuma is a sad boy, no one know what actually happened to him after the game ended, or at least two ninjas with feelings, so I'mma make shit up for mah boy, so I've decided to remedy, so here's ninjas with feelings, that have nothing to do with Naruto, that is a tragedy, this is pure angst for angst's sake ya'll
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-29
Updated: 2018-06-29
Packaged: 2019-05-30 02:55:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15087455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KittyWillCutYou/pseuds/KittyWillCutYou
Summary: Shinobi had little to show for themselves in terms of honor and what little they did possess was fleeting, minuscule, flexible at the best and worst of times.“Harden your heart, young one. Guard your soul.”But it's far too late, we're already dead inside.





	The Many Shades of Death

Hotsuma had long ago learned to steel himself to the things that might be required of him as a shinobi.

Shinobi had little to show for themselves in terms of true honor and what little they did possess was fleeting, minuscule, flexible at the best and worst of times.

For the most part, shinobi had no honor to speak of, but they knew how to be loyal, to the clan most of all. Loyalty was often all many of them had. Obey your masters unless it threatens the clan. Any and all threats to the clan were to be wiped out. Eliminated, without hesitation, without question.

Master Kobushi had taught them to harden their hearts, to dull their feelings. To silence it all in the name of duty.

“Harden your heart, young one. Guard your soul.”

But here, in these dark woods, through the burning city streets, the corpses of his dead comrades, his dead family members, they roamed. They stalked him like predators in the night. Hiruko’s magic had reduced the majority of them to mere puppets; meat lurching forward with muscles loosened from the atrophy of death and decay by black magic, and Hotsuma’s blood boiled.

Even in death, they could not rest.

They deserved better than this. Slaughtered and resurrected, souls bound to bodies that no longer breathed, only to be cut down in the streets like animals. Akujiki hummed in his hands, forever thirsting for blood and souls and his mouth tasted of ash as he cut through another corpse, the body gurgling on congealed blood, groaning in agony.

Its weight slid from his blade with a whisper of cloth and a thump, an anguished noise of pain, and Hotsuma whispered a prayer for for forgiveness and safe passage for the soul of yet another he had failed as a leader. Hiruko would burn for what he’d unleashed, Hotsuma would make sure of that. He believed he owed his clan this much, at least.

Something moved in the foliage, the wind smelling of cherry blossoms, soil and blood and Hotsuma brought his blade to bare on pure instinct. Another blade met his with a resounding clang of steel on steel and he raised his head to stare into a pair of eyes he thought he’d never see again. 

Her face was not covered by a talisman like many of the deceased Oboro clan corpses, dark magic forcing their bodies into parodies of natural movements. Too far gone to have any sense of self left, just souls trapped and along for the ride. No minds to speak of.

Her face was pale in death, cold but still quite beautiful. He could never forget that face. It was once kind and warm no matter the darkness of their world. “Nojiko.” He hadn’t meant to say her name aloud, but it was too late now and painful memories surfaced of the older beautiful woman with a kind smile for him and Moritsune and Ageha.

Kobushi-sama raised them after their parents died, but she had been a parental figure as well along with some others. A softer touch to lend an ear or to ask advice or to soothe hurts. 

Her brown eyes flickered with intelligence for just a moment before Hotsuma managed to force her away, her tanto screaming as it scraped against the edge Akujiki’s blade. He remembered her skill with the short blades, how precise she was. She’d shown Ageha how to hold them properly for the first time and Hotsuma’s heart ached for things long past.

Gracefully, the kunoichi bounded a ways away from him, landing silently on light feet, her pale blue kimono still pristine after her death and subsequent resurrection. It hurt to look at her, at the familiar cant of her head, white flowers patterning the edge of her skirt and flowing sleeves. “Nojiko-Oba-san, do you know me?” he asked and he brought his blade to bare with the edge turned upwards when she twitched.

Without a word, she launched at him and swept beneath his strike, trying to break into his defenses. His range was longer than it was when he was a boy, longer still with the katana, but she’d always been fast. Hotsuma dodged back out of her reach, wary of the needles and small blades he knew she kept hidden in the folds of her clothes and armor.

Every bit of her sharpened and poisoned.

Her hair arched up in a waterfall of glossy black, every inch of it a dare Hotsuma was too seasoned to act on. She liked to hide things in her hair, he remembered, things that would maime and cut. “Kunoichi have to use every bit of what they have,” she’d whispered conspiratorially to Ageha in the depths of his memories, knowing that he and Moritsune were listening just as avidly.

He’d watched her take her nails and claw a man’s face to ribbons, the wounds welling up purple not seconds later as the man convulsed, his flesh no doubt feeling like it was on fire from more than just the maiming. 

The edge of her tanto swept towards his face and he leaned back to let is sweep harmlessly past the bridge of his nose, gleaming wetly as it went.

Of course, it was poisoned.

He grit his teeth beneath the tattered cloth of his scarf, watching the smooth planes of her face for any shift and knowing that even if there was some piece of her left inside her shell, it didn’t matter. She was still every bit as dead as the rest of the Oboro.

“I will end your suffering.” He whispered, “Oba-san, forgive me.” A volley of senbon dogged his steps, piercing the earth beneath his feet where he’d been standing moments before. 

“Forgive you for what?” 

The memory of her voice shattered through his thoughts and brought with it a flood of emotions better left to the past. He nearly took a kunai to the face in his moment of inattention and he cursed his lack of focus. Sloppy. Kobushi would have taken him to task for the mistake if he had seen, clan-head or not.

They met in the middle again, blades clashing in vicious blows meant to kill and Hotsuma nearly took his opponent’s head off with a vicious swing of his sword, but Nojiko just managed to avoid the blow. She frowned at him unexpectedly, the first true display of emotion since engaging him in the woods and then her hands moved and senbon flew from her sleeves. 

The deadly needles whistled through the air, impaling trees and stones and earth until there was distance between them once more.

“You blame yourself for our deaths.” she said, her voice soft and her blade glinting in the low light cast from the bloated moon as she tilted it just so. “Even though it was out of your control. That’s so like you, Hotsuma.” It was so different from other battles he'd faced against his fallen comrades. How they sometimes raged at him, bitter over the fates that they had been dealt.

She sounded almost _amused_ and it unsettled him more than he would have liked to admit. “I was your leader.” He said, as if that explained everything and perhaps it did. He was younger still when he became clan head. Nojiko simply shook her head and sighed. “The fault does not lie with you.”

In a blur of pale blue fabric and dark lacquered armor, she charged him but instead of dodging the thrust of his blade, she surprised him by skewering herself directly onto Akujiki. Hotsuma had been preparing himself for anything...except a move like that. He could only watch in surprise and despair as she forced herself further onto his blade, steel piercing through her chest and out through her back.

“Stop-...” he pleaded barely above a whisper, watching as she wrapped her strong hands around the blade and gripped it until it cut into her palms. Akujiki hummed in satisfaction and glowed red with malice and in that moment Hotsuma hated the cursed blade more than anything in the world. “The fault does not lie with you.” Nojiko rasped, drawing closer and closer. Finally her knees buckled and blood overflowed from her mouth and Hotsuma could take no more.

Perhaps it was foolish of him, no he knew it was foolish of him, but he reached out as she fell to her knees with his blade still buried in her chest. “The fault does not lie with you, Hotsuma.” She reached out, cradled in his arms and bleeding. Hotsuma felt the tips of her fingers upon his face, cold and smearing blood with a delicate touch.

She smiled at him, like she did so long ago and then the life left her eyes just like so many others, leaving him alone in the forest.

Empty like all the rest.

Just a corpse in pale blue.

**Author's Note:**

> So if ya'll don't already know, Shinobi is an old PS2 game that came out in 2002.
> 
> It was dark, it was bloody, it was a lot of fun, the sountrack _slapped_ and at the end, nobody really knew what happened to Hotsuma. 
> 
> My homie, my boy, my sad sad babe. His whole clan got merced like, what, four years after he was named clan head and he was more or less the only survivor. 
> 
> Oh yeah _someone_ (*cough* Ageha *cough* *cough*) got the bright idea to wake up an evil sorcerer in order resurrect her beau (Moritsune) and get revenge on the Oboro clan for killing said beau in a battle to the death to determine the clan head and the new master of a demon-possessed sword called Akujiki, four years prior to the game's start.
> 
> Obviously things...did not work out exactly how she planned because Hiruko did indeed bring Moritsune back...but also the whole Oboro clan as mostly mindless undead minions trapped in their own bodies to do his bidding....which was kill everyone and take over the world.
> 
> And demons. Oh hell yeah lots of demons. Like, _a fuck load_.
> 
> So Hotsuma, freshly reeling from the trauma of EVERYONE DYING, is forced to slaughter EVERYONE AGAIN, including his big brother because TRAUMA ™. Did I not say my boy was a sad sad boy? Like he plays it hella cool in the game but inner him is realistically three sheets to the wind, I am numb, hello darkness my old friend.
> 
> Because ninja are fucked in the head, I don't care what universe this is.


End file.
